Blues For Sonny Gholson Poem by Jared Carter

Blues for Sonny Gholson

to the memory of Robert 'Sonny' Gholson,
Indianapolis musician and teacher,1931-1993

Most of the time you and I blew
past each other like the uptown bus
and the downtown bus in a heavy rain -
you blind all your life, my hearing going,
taking the high notes with it. But
once in a while I would get lucky,
be invited to a party in the Inner City,
and you would be there, playing the blues
with just a touch of boogie thrown in,
along with something indefinable -
an echo of the Avenue, back in the days
of Jack Dupree and Montana Taylor,
all those old cats still going strong
in the way you bore down on the keys.

When you let me sit in, I tried to capture
something even older, like the flickering
of newsreels in a neighborhood theater,
with May Aufderheide at the upright -
Jack Johnson shaking hands with Caruso,
both of them holding up straw skimmers,
Little Egypt doing the hoochie-kooch
at the Chicago Fair - all those old rhythms
and syncopations mostly forgotten now,
put up on the shelf with stride piano
and rent-party music - except for times
when they come back, for an hour or two,
like ghosts on Halloween.

Or like that night
in late November, in the early Nineties,
when you and I took turns coaxing
an ancient, out-of-tune, grand piano
with no middle C, in a legend of a house
where they say Gershwin was a guest,
and the dizzy hostess read the palms
of Doug and Mary. The place was
mobbed that night, with plenty to eat
and lots of booze, and people jammed
into the dining-room and kitchen.
Out on the back porch, an Irish band
played sprightly jigs and sad laments;
in the big front room with the fireplace,
you and I were left to our own devices.
It would be the last time I heard you do
'So Long Blues' and 'Honeysuckle Rose, '
the last time you sat across the room
tapping out an extra lick or two
while I zipped through 'Rialto Ripples'
and 'Dizzy Fingers.' Your turn again,
and we went on that way, late into the night.

Goodbye, Sonny, and god bless. Let not
the dark thee cumber. You played the blues
the way it ought to be. Listening to you,
I felt like I'd been cold and out of work,
without a dime to my name, and suddenly
glanced up and saw a ten-dollar bill
blowing down the sidewalk, heading my way.


First published in Pemmican.